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Archive for the ‘Pollution’ Category

The Baikal Pulp and Paper mill in Baikalsk has had a troubled history. Since it started operations in 1966 it has polluted Lake Baikal. It was one of the few targets of environmental protests during the Soviet Union period. Before the mill was built, scientists from the Irkutsk State University’s Scientific Institute of Biology spoke out against Nikita Khrushchev’s plans to build a pulp and paper mill on the shore of Lake Baikal. Marina Rikhvanova, a founder of the NGO Baikal Ecological Wave and the 2008 winner of the Goldman Prize, is among those fighting to close down the mill.(more…)

The Chilean State Defence Council (CDE) has filed a 2 billion peso (US$3.9 million) lawsuit against Celulosa Arauco y Constitución SA (Celco) for environmental damage and health risks caused by the company’s pollution of the Matauito River.

Antonia Fortt, head of NGO Oceana‘s Marine Contamination campaign, said the lawsuit will be of interest also to other communities which have suffered pollution from CELCO’s pulp plants – communities like Valdivia, Mehuín, Arauco, Nueva Aldea, and Constitución.

In April 2006, waste water from two paper mills in Inner Mongolia spilled out of containment ponds and flooded the village of Sugai. Villagers were forced to leave their homes. “The smell made me want to vomit,” one villager told New York Times reporter Jim Yardley.